November 28, 2009

I'm not exactly Mr. Finger-on-the-Pulse-of-America, but sometimes I stumble onto something early, and I'm not above gloating over it over and over:

- "The Blind Side" -- It earned $11 million on its first Friday in release, and $16 million on its second Friday in release, which means it has big legs. In contrast, the Twilight: New Moon, dropped from $72 million to $18 million. I've been telling you that a large fraction of the public wants to see a movie about how Republicans are actually nice because they like blacks.

- Toby Gerhart -- About what you'd expect: a 45-38 victory for Stanford over Notre Dame, with Gerhart rushing for 205 yards and three touchdowns on 29 carries. Less expected was his completing two passes for 32 yards and a touchdown. Stanford finishes the regular season 8-4, with Gerhart rushing for 1730 yards and 26 touchdowns. I suspect he needed a 27th touchdown in the last minute against Cal to have a decent shot at winning the Heisman.

Steve, I and many others would be interested in a thread on ClimateGate. Your fellow Steve, Mr. McIntyre, is the Sailer of global warming and I mean that with the greatest praise to both parties.

In many ways the warming issue is structurally similar to hbd, though the faux "consensus" was manufactured back during Carleton Putnams time. The interesting thing about it is the strategy it suggests to one man on a mission. I f you -- yes, you -- want to make a difference, forget about voting or volunteering per se. Those are safety valves. Instead sign up to some progrssive cause. Make everyone believe you are a progressive. Tell no one. And then, once you are within the sanctum santorum, carefully extract a cache of documents and emails and then release them untraceably on the Internet.

Can you imagine what access to Obama's internalcampaign memos or the NYT's internalemail would reveal? Newspapers are the best target for this kind of activity, especially if you are software savvy and go in as a technological friend, willing to help them out in their time of digital need. Do it before they orchestrate a "call" for a media bailout (who does the calling after all?)

Less expected was his completing two passes for 32 yards and a touchdown.

?

Every box score I've seen shows him attempting and completing only one pass, for 18 yards and a touchdown.

I suspect he needed a 27th touchdown in the last minute against Cal to have a decent shot at winning the Heisman.

He'd probably still be a longshot, despite his great season. Too bad his Stanford career got off to a slow start -- i.e. his first two years (he was injured and did not play for almost all of 2007). And if his numbers last year, while good, had been a bit better...

No, I don't think so. He gets props for persistence, and he's certainly on the "incorrect" side of the debate, but I think the parallel ends there.

In HBD and global warming (AGW), we find that the scientists who are most intensely involved in the day-to-day data gathering and analysis pretty much agree on what the science says, while those involved more in the periphery or who aren't scientists tend to have the loudest skeptical voices. The difference is that with HBD what the science says is "dangerous", and so the scientists tend to be rather circumspect in their language and humble in their claims. With global-warming, what the science says is exactly what the elite want to hear (that Western Civilization and free-market activity are destroying the world!), so the scientists tend to be brazen in their pronouncements and ruthless in stifling dissent - and why not, they have both science and morality on their side.

So McIntyre is basically reduced to railing at data manipulation and nitpicking at calculation procedures - kind of like what HBD-deniers do. Indeed, both HBD-deniers and AGW-deniers have notably picked on Principle Components Analysis methodologies, ironically (though in the latter case with a bit more success, I admit).

Even though it was against Notre Dame, a team with an explosive offense and a terrible defense, I was mightily impressed with Toby yesterday. He looked like the big kid in the schoolyard, the one who doesn't go down until at least 3 kids pile on him. I'm starting to think he could be a force in the pros; he's a real freak. Too bad we didn't get to see him here in the East until they played the Irish.

He's got my vote for the Heisman, which doesn't do him much good since no one is asking for my vote. But either McCoy or Tebow will take that award, both of whom are deserving of the prize.

The Blind Side should cruise to 150 million domestic, possibly even 200 million, which is pretty stunning for a film that probably cost 35-40 million dollars to make. I suspect that like other crowd-pleasing heartwarmers it will continue to rake in tons of money as well on DVD and be a staple on the basic cable channels for the next 20 years.

I suspect this will baffle the hell out of a lot of the HBDers here (though not Steve), who have a hard time believing that most white Americans (even Republicans) actually like black people and want to see them succeed.

How about a column on climategate? Though Sailer's speciality isn't the weather, the scientific collusion, corruption, and fraud involved with this scandal may shed light on what happens in all the other departments, especially in human biological sciences. Indeed, not just amongst scientists but between scientists, politicians, bureaucrats, and media wonks. How I'd love to hack into their emails. Alas, I don't even know how to hack a piece of wood.

"The interesting thing about it is the strategy it suggests to one man on a mission. I f you -- yes, you -- want to make a difference, forget about voting or volunteering per se. Those are safety valves. Instead sign up to some progrssive cause. Make everyone believe you are a progressive. Tell no one. And then, once you are within the sanctum santorum, carefully extract a cache of documents and emails and then release them untraceably on the Internet."

I volunteer Half Sigma! This would actually be beneficial and a more productive use of his time. Seriously, if he isn't too old for a career change, I think he would genuinely enjoy working as a spy for the government. Working for Rightist causes might be better OTOH.

Well, one thing you could menton is that the right wing violence that DHS secretary Janet Napolitano predicted has begun: four police officers were shot dead in a Seattle coffeehouse (where else?) by this right wing nutso who bears a striking resemblance to a former Illinois senator.

Says the article: "The paper-trail left behind by Monfort suggests a man whose idealism may have soured over time into disillusionment...Monfort earned his bachelors in Law, Societies and Justice at the University of Washington in March of 2008. Afterwards, he applied for a minority scholars program...While in the UW scholarship program, Monfort focused on the work of Paul Butler, a law professor at George Washington University. Butler is a proponent of a controversial tactic known as jury nullification, whereby a jury can ignore a judge's instructions and acquit defendants, especially black defendants convicted of a non-violent crime, no matter how strong the case against them."

Just another violent right-wing white nationalist shooting up the place...

Oh please Steve. The Blind Side is about on the par with the Grudge. In fact, it will probably earn about the same money as that movie.

There is not any real appetite for that sort of thing any more than there is for horror hounds. Twilight is pretty awful, but slides in its extraordinary first week were to be expected.

In fact, if I were an investor, I'd be sure that Twilight made more money, a lot more, than the fantasy of Black kids as pets (which is what the Blind Side is) in the revenue stream that counts: DVD + Foreign DVD + TV Rights (free/pay/foreign). The Twilight fans lining up means they can be milked for DVDs, special edition DVDs, Directors Cut DVDs, and so on. Buying in the first month when the studio gets a maximum cut. Instead of renting out of Redbox for $1.

You do know that studios get only 17% or so of revenues from theatrical box office don't you?

Whiskey/testing99/evilneocon, you keep pushing the line that the Grudge (what a bizarre comparison!) is a bigger hit than the Blind Side when it peaked at 110 million domestic. Blind Side is at 100 in week 2 and looks set to go to 175-200 million domestic, which is a spectacular haul on a 30 million dollar film. Additionally, it's exactly the kind of film that will have a hugely long shelf life on basic cable as well as DVD, continuing to make money for the studio for decades to come. Whatever you think about this film, Steve is absolutely correct that it's hit a cultural nerve.

I was quite surprised by the strong anti-adoption sentiment in one of the previous threads on this subject. I don't think the idea that adoption is an evil siphoning of resources away from biological children is one that is going to gain much traction on any part of the political spectrum. (Evem more strangely, the earlier thread also included attacks on couples who adopted precisely because they were unable to conceive biological children.)

Ronald Reagan and Jesse Helms were adoptive parents, for heaven's sake. It would be a shame if the Brangelina designer baby stereotype overshadowed and absorbed the actions of the many normal and selfless adoptive parents.

In fact, if I were an investor, I'd be sure that Twilight made more money, a lot more, than the fantasy of Black kids as pets (which is what the Blind Side is) in the revenue stream that counts: DVD + Foreign DVD + TV Rights (free/pay/foreign).

Twilight is going to make more money than just about any movie. Steve's point is a valid one.

I just saw Bob Costas interview Michael Oher on TV. Mr. Oher sounded like he was 7 or 8. Costas and the others in the studio talked about how smart he was. If I'm not mistaken, the word "sophisticated" was even used. He sounded like a child. I do not believe that he has an IQ of 96 for a second. Perhaps if he responded to Costas's questions with grunts, they would have compared him with Einstein.

Hey, a little off-topic, but how about we get a thread on the diversity-a-looza at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue which has Hamas members being whisked through security and right into state dinners without having to show any credentials.

[BTW, their family has a history of mis-identification as Israelis - still can't tell whether they are Palestinian Christians or Palestinian Muslims.]

Terry Bradshaw went on a rant about Toby Gerhart as the most deserving Heisman candidate... except he only referred to Gerhart as "that boy at Stanford"...

Thankfully the Negro Curt Menefee was there to give Toby Gerhart's name and to subtly concur with Bradshaw. He said that Gerhart "did it the right way", "performing on the field before he got the media hype". In a way, it's cruel to give this kind of hope and awareness to a superstar like Gerhart when it's way too late to influence the actual Heisman voters. It's not like Gerhart gave a shocking/eye-opening final-game performance; he just did his typical 200yd/3td thing. One gets the impression that the football establishment just wanted to pay lip-service to his success to fly cover for their role in completely ignoring him.

>I don't think the idea that adoption is an evil siphoning of resources away from biological children is one that is going to gain much traction on any part of the political spectrum. <

If anyone is against adoption per se, I'm unaware of it. At issue instead is a particular kind of adoption: adopting outside one's race. This is, indeed, "unselfish" in genenic sense (cf. the selfish gene et al.).

And why wouldn't it have traction? As Steve pointed out, there is a financial cost as well as a long-term genetic cost. They're writing NAMs into their will, reducing the money going to their biological (generally same-race) children. Money happens to be a subject of rather intense interest among a segment of people on every part of the political spectrum.

With global-warming, what the science says is exactly what the elite want to hear (that Western Civilization and free-market activity are destroying the world!), so the scientists tend to be brazen in their pronouncements and ruthless in stifling dissent - and why not, they have both science and morality on their side.

Not only is the myth of global warming FALSE - we have entered into the most sudden cessation of sunspot activity in a century or more, and we are in perilous danger of facing the looming specter of a mini-Ice Age - not only is the myth FALSE, but we now know beyond a shadow of a doubt that the entire myth was INTENTIONALLY MANUFACTURED by the myth-making hoaxsters.

God d*mn it, it's depressing to see this kind of inanity on an ostensibly paleo-con board.

Or maybe "ziel" was being sarcastic?

Maybe he was making a subtly semantic wisecrack about the pagan religion of Science-ism?

PS: Last night I sent my brother an email about the comments in the East Anglia source code, and he wrote me back a rather lengthy email informing me that the AGW-Truthers had already - YEARS AGO!!! - reverse-engineered the CRU data and had realized that exactly these sorts of shenanigans were taking place.

PPS: Are you guys aware that [apparently] they pulled a Joseph Djugashvili and airbrushed about a century's worth of data right out of the history books? As in they [intentionally] destroyed it and [apparently] there aren't any backup copies of it?!?

I promise to do only what those patron saints of unbiased justice Barack Obama and Eric Holder promise to do - to prove America's commitment to a fair trial by guaranteeing a guilty verdict.

Oddly, my correction is posted before my original post. The left-wing Monfort is guilty in another cop killing. Ironically, though, this weekend's 4 cop massacre outside Seattle had even more serious political ramifications. The suspect was set free from jail by Mike Huckabilly.

His political career is over, thank God. It's just too bad it took the death of 4 police officers to end it.

The Blind Side should cruise to 150 million domestic, possibly even 200 million, which is pretty stunning for a film that probably cost 35-40 million dollars to make.

The upper bounds of your predicted success would make it half as successful as The Passion. So yes, it'd be a stunning success. That being the case, it would be a good idea for Hollywood to follow up that success by following the trail it blazed.

But, what was that trail? Is it really about watching blacks succeed? Or is it about watching Red Staters succeed? Is the Blue Stater version (Precious) as popular? These are not rhetorical questions (Precious is not just different on Blue-Red divide; I don't know if The Blind Side's success is about blacks succeeding or Red Staters succeeding or both; it still has to go out and make that 200 mil, etc.).

I suspect this will baffle the hell out of a lot of the HBDers here (though not Steve), who have a hard time believing that most white Americans (even Republicans) actually like black people and want to see them succeed.

I do know that Red Staters desperately want to see blacks succeed without big gubbmint. I don't see that as translating into warm feelings about blacks. People go to the movies to escape, and I think this film definitely qualifies on that score.

Whites want to have warm feelings about blacks, I think that much is safe to say. But I don't see how people who don't live around blacks (and who, generally speaking, go through a lot to avoid them, and therefore don't really know them), can be said to have warm feelings toward them. (As Steve points out, this film isn't going to persuade whites to go out and adopt blacks)

I mean, it's not for nothing that white "racism" is more common in the southeast. I suspect the racial attraction of this film (and similarly, your suspicion that whites want blacks to succeed) has more to do with wanting a problem to go away - escapism - than it does with racial amity.

Sorry, I meant 1/3 of the success of The Passion. I'd say it has a much better chance of follow-ups than Passion, but it does seem to glorify Red Staters so we'll have to wait and see. My guess is if there are follow-ups, they'll be all sizzle and no steak, i.e., they'll run the risk of excising the parts that offend Blue Staters.

Actually, the first article I saw linked at Drudge (yesterday) said the police were looking for a black male suspect, 5'7"-6'. It stuck out like a sore thumb, and my immediate assumption was that mass murder of 4 policemen trumped PC.

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